If the delivery man hadn’t been ringing the bell so insistently, Amy felt quite sure they would have slid down on to the floor right then and there. Instead, she turned Daniel around and swatted at his behind to send him on his way, then ran up the stairs to the bedroom.
‘PJs, PJs,’ she mumbled, opening cupboards. Working at the Forge three or four nights a week meant that she had never spent more than a night at a time at Daniel’s, so she had only ever got around to leaving a toothbrush. Generally she didn’t wear anything to bed, but after the rain, her legs were cold. Where would he have put his pyjamas? All of his clothes were impeccably cleaned, pressed and stacked in neat little piles, his shirts on hangers and lined up in descending order of blueness. It was all so pristine, Amy didn’t want to disturb anything.
‘Ah, here we go.’ She found some cotton pyjama bottoms and pulled them on. No matching top, though – not a bad thing, she didn’t want to look entirely sexless. Maybe she’d left a vest top here. Amy was nowhere near as organised as Daniel; she was pretty sure there were a few odd things of hers around somewhere. As she searched, a flicker of something caught her eye in the darkness of the wardrobe. She reached out and pulled it down. A sequinned cardigan.
What the hell?
Her heart began to pound as she examined it. It was heavy, expensive; Giorgio Armani Black Label. Definitely not hers. Definitely.
‘Amy? Are you coming?’
She looked up as Daniel called from the bottom of the stairs, then back to the cardigan. Her throat was dry; she wanted to swallow but couldn’t. Perhaps there was a logical explanation for a strange cardigan being in her boyfriend’s wardrobe. Perhaps. But her mind was leaping to one conclusion: it was another woman’s. A chic, rich woman, a woman who had been here – in his bedroom.
‘Amy?’
Ignoring Daniel’s calls, she strode over to the chest of drawers and yanked the top one open, pulling the neatly paired socks out in handfuls, dropping them on to the floor.
Where is it? Where is it? Three weeks ago, there had been a Tiffany box hidden there. A ring, a necklace, some exciting gift certainly. But . . . Her hands ran along the back of the drawer. Nothing. Nothing there except socks. So where was it? Where was the box?
She looked up suddenly. Daniel was standing in the doorway, holding a bag of prawn crackers.
‘What’s going on?’ he said. ‘It’s getting cold.’
Amy couldn’t speak. Instead she held up the sequinned cardigan, now screwed up into a tight ball.
‘What’s that? A cardigan?’ he said innocently.
‘Yes,’ said Amy, glaring at him. ‘It’s a cardigan. Not my cardigan.’
And there it was: the flicker of recognition, quickly followed by a look of dismay. If Amy had blinked, she would have missed it. But she didn’t.
‘Oh. It must be my mum’s,’ said Daniel, recovering himself. ‘She was here over Christmas. I must have put it away thinking it was yours.’
It was plausible, if unlikely; a decent actor might have been able to pull it off. But Daniel was not a good actor and he was a terrible liar. Why would he ever have had to develop the skill? He’d always had everything handed to him on a plate.
‘Your mother?’ said Amy, her voice dripping with contempt.
‘She was shopping on the High Street, dropped in for lunch.’
‘Really?’ she said quietly. ‘Is that the best you can do?’
‘Amy, what’s got into you?’ he said, taking a step towards her. ‘You’re behaving like a crazy lady.’
‘Where’s the Tiffany box?’ she said.
‘What Tiffany box?’
‘The Tiffany box hidden in your sock drawer before Christmas,’ she said slowly, deliberately, watching his face. Another flicker. Her heart sank – so it was true. Right then, she knew it was all true.
‘What were you doing going through my sock drawer?’ said Daniel.
Yeah, good move, thought Amy. Go on the attack.
‘Answer the question,’ she said, feeling suddenly weary. ‘Where is the box?’
‘It was a present. A key ring.’
‘For your mother, I suppose.’